With a flurry of legislation, Vermont lawmakers try to bring down health care costs
VTDigger
For years, Vermont lawmakers have aimed a barrage of legislation at a seemingly intractable and impossibly complex problem: health care costs are increasingly unaffordable for residents.
Vermonters and their insurers spend $12,756 per person on direct health care annually — making Vermont the seventh-highest spending state in the U.S, according to 2020 data from the health policy think tank KFF. And between 1991 and 2020, Vermont’s annual health care spending per capita grew faster than any other state, KFF reported.
Separately, rising insurance premiums have outpaced wage growth and strained residents’ wallets, advocates say. Last year, when insurers requested double-digit rate increases, many members of the public responded with alarm.